Maybe this guy needs to list Editing Wikipedia as his primary job and Professor at Auburn University as his 2nd job?
Perhaps, but I suspect this story says more about Auburn University Montgomery than it says about his research profile.
I had never heard of Auburn University Montgomery before today; given the nature of this story, I don't expect ever to hear of it in any serious context again.
... anyone who knows anything about computers can easily see that it's just a thin sheen of technobabble hastily thrown on top of a standard action movie. Props to the guy they got to do the UNIX commands in the real life scenes, but other than that, the tech stuff was so out of this world...
That gets to the heart of the difference between Legacy and Tron, and I'm surprised I haven't seen that comment made more widely. Tron's world-inside-the-computer was visually cool, but it also allowed those in the know to geek out a little over how they rendered real computer concepts. Tron had --
programmes as characters (of course);
a bit as a minor character (Disnification, sure, but it's true to the core conceit);
the MCP assimilating other programmes' functions;
a "game grid" that actually related isomorphically to what was going on in real-world game machines;
I/O "towers" representing the central importance of control over information.
All of these things were part of the world-inside conceit. In Legacy, by contrast, the only thing remaining is programmes-as-characters. We now get to see that they have code (but why? shouldn't they be binary blobs?), but all of the rest of it has vanished. The game grid has been retained as well, but now it's meaningless! Surely more people have noticed that ALL the computer-geek stuff is in the real world -- NONE of it is inside the machine? As a result, the world inside the machine is nothing more than a cool-looking veneer over a generic and dull fantasy setting.
Now, the game Tron 2.0 (by contrast, again) absolutely nailed the core idea. It added nifty mechanics like permissions, viruses, and code optimisation; missions that involved things like getting through a firewall, hacking servers, compiling code, escaping from a HDD format, and getting a PDA to do what you tell it by draining its battery.
Both sequels looked cool. But the sequel that really carried on the cool ideas in the original is to be forgotten, alas. Instead we've got the utterly unengaging fantasy realm as "canon". Sigh.
Do you know of a good alternative? I agree, the pages related to my field are horrible and at looking at the discussions, practically uncorrectable [...] I do appreciate what is there though, particularly for subjects that other resources would neglect.
Well, there's always a trade-off between expertise and general coverage. So when choosing what to devote my efforts to, I'll go for more specialised venues, basically.
For academic subjects, a partial solution in print/e-book format is specialised, ad hoc encyclopaedias with references (so NOT like the Britannica, which is a horribly awful example of an encyclopaedia in almost every way). Still better is the current trend for "companions", i.e. volumes on a specific topic with entire in-depth chapters on sub-topics written by experts. For my own use (and not just in my field), the best series are currently those published by CUP and Blackwell. Either of these avoids the danger of cliques with tyrannical power, precisely because they're smaller, more autonomous, projects.
There are online equivalents, of course; here's one project that I have a great deal of respect for, though I'm not a contributor myself, and though I think it wouldn't take much for quality control to slip badly. But I think you'll agree it's pretty damn specialised. (Even there I have found errors, but the reason I haven't signed up and corrected them yet is because I'm still working on publishing the independent research that would serve as a basis for correcting them:-)
For areas outside my speciality, you're right, resources like Wikipedia are often unavoidable. That's the trade-off I was talking about. But I get the impression that we're more talking about the question of what resources an expert should be trying to contribute to. In academic areas, I'd say the most productive thing to do is edit or contribute to companions, specialist encyclopaedias, or moderated online equivalents thereof. And, when academics are not doing research or writing it up in journal articles, this is pretty much exactly what they do spend their time doing!
I doubt that, Wikipedia has thousands of revisions on even less important topics and mistakes get corrected out pretty quick, of course, if you find any 'mistakes' then perhaps you should try to fix them as any expert in any field should be doing..
I can certainly vouch for the GP's sentiment in my own area of expertise. I actually use Wikipedia primarily as a tool for finding out what kinds of misinformation there are floating around in the wild; it's a useful gauge of what misinformation is popularly perceived to be "true".
Experts have much better things to do than edit Wikipedia; it's abundantly clear that all editing is controlled by people with vested interests who use opaque processes to silence dissent. Experts do have a responsibility to write popular science, targetted at educated non-specialists. However, there's absolutely no point doing so in a venue that will invariably introduce errors after it's been written.
or The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus? (OK, I can see how that might not be for everyone... but I find it hard to imagine someone liking Twelve Monkeys but not Imaginarium.)
Heck I haggle on small ticket items. When I buy wine, if I find a good one I'll ask for a discount if I buy 3 or more bottles.
I bet the restaurants just loooove you.
It would be obvious to anyone with half a braincell that this is not a tactic that you employ after you've already received the product (when you get up to pay in a restaurant) or with someone who literally has no power to offer deals (the checkout operator). Trying to haggle before you eat the meal is entirely reasonable, however.
When haggling is practised in a non-brain-dead way, the GP is absolutely correct. If you're in a supermarket looking at the wine section and you talk to someone who actually has some responsibility in that section, then sure they might be willing to consider giving you a deal if you're buying a case at a time. (Getting a deal on three bottles, as the GP says... well, good luck.) If you're in an electronics shop and you talk to someone who isn't (a) someone on their first day on the job, (b) a powerless checkout operator, or (c) an ass, of course it's OK to discuss alternative pricing options. (If the sitation is (c), it is of course best to go to a different shop.)
They might be less willing if the product you're after is already discounted, but then we're back in "Is brain operational?" territory; it's still worth a try, but don't get your hopes up.
TaoPhoenix's useful summary of the development of the "fruitfly" correctly points out that the summary is missing an o. However, the author incorrectly describes this as a syntax error.(1)
This is not a syntax error but a morphology error. Syntax refers to the study of observed patterns in the sequential arrangement of words or lexemes;(2) morphology refers to the study of how lexemes change their form (e.g. requiring an extra "o" or not).(3)
In addition, the author's use of the spelling "Drosophilia" is a morphology error. ("Drosophilia" would signify "the love of dew" in the abstract; "Drosophila", with the implied substantive "zoa", signifies "life-forms that love dew".)(4),(5)
I think that kind of attitude to classics is a direct consequence of how classics are chosen for schooling purposes. I don't know why, but high school curricula tend to focus on the most depressing reading they can find. Given a choice between two classics, where one is fun and/or uplifting and the other is depressing and/or horrifying, they'll always opt for the latter. Compare the following two lists:
Madame Bovary; The Idiot; Hard Times; Jane Eyre; Heart of Darkness; Catcher in the Rye; Nineteen Eighty-Four; the Iliad
Painful, degrading; books to slit your wrists to. Even dreary in some cases. Great, maybe, but horrible. However:
Tom Jones; Crime and Punishment; The Pickwick Papers; Pride and Prejudice; Robinson Crusoe; Dangerous Liaisons; the Odyssey; The Three Musketeers
Terrific, human, inspiring; when they're not uplifting, they make up for it by being funny. Completely different, even though two authors and one epic tradition appear in both lists.
So why not go for the second list? Actually, I think I know the reason: it's politics. Tom Jones and Dangerous Liaisons have too much sex, Marx liked Robinson Crusoe, Pride and Prejudice sends the wrong messages about gender roles, the Odyssey sends the message that vengeance is OK (obviously it isn't; vengeance is only OK in war, like in the Iliad) and so on. I guess books that encourage suicidal depression are fine, though.
What on earth are you talking about? or even think you are talking about? What is it you imagine Google has done here? Conroy was simply attacking Google to distract attention from how much everyone hates the censorship, not because Google had done or said anything at all.
Maybe a full transcript of his remarks will help. TRANSCRIPT follows. Context: the host is trying to get quick closing comments from the Minister and from Colin Jacobs, the VP of Electronic Frontiers Australia. He asks for a closing comment from the Minister first; Jacobs is not given a chance to comment. (No one has even mentioned Google, Inc.)
CONROY. And while I appreciate some people might want to elevate the internet into something special, could I just draw them back to the - this argument, and those who advocate this argument, I mean recently the founder of Google have got themselves into a little bit of trouble because, notwithstanding -
HOST. Mm.
CONROY. - their alleged "Do no evil" policy, they recently created something called, ah, "Buzz", and there was a - a reaction, ah, and people said, well look, aren't you publishing private information.
HOST. Mm.
CONROY. And -
HOST. We are almost out of time, by the way, Minister.
CONROY. - Mr Schmidt said, said the following: "If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place." This is the founder of Google.
HOST. Mm.
CONROY. He also said recently to Wall Street analysts, "We - love - cash." In a sentence, that was it, just "We - love - cash."
HOST. Yes, heh heh -
CONROY. So when people say, shouldn't we just leave it up to, y'know the Googles of this world - to determine - what the filtering policy should be, and make no mistake, anybody who wants to go onto Google's sites now and look up their filtering policy will actually find - they filter more material -
HOST. Minister -
CONROY. - on a broader range of topics than we are proposing to do for what -
HOST. We, we have - uh - we - heh -
CONROY. I'll back our parliament to stand fast on these issues rather than Google.
HOST. We have to wrap it.
CONROY. Thank you.
HOST. Good to talk to you. Thanks very much... [thanks guests, end of programme]
It's actually extremely hard to create such universes. No one has ever made one, as we speak. Not only there are hardware limitations (for example, a HL2 level takes almost all of 1 GB), but there are also software limitations.
I just came here after playing some Morrowind. That takes a lot less than 1 GB. Even heavily modded to make it look visually stunning it takes less than 1 GB.
Now, sure, there are serious immersion-breaking AI limitations, gameplay irritations, it's got olde-style graphics, and the art design isn't to everyone's taste. But I still find it a hell of a lot more immersive than any game published since that I can think of. No invisible walls; no unopenable doors; no unkillable NPCs; lethal parts of the world are explicably lethal; major towns are major, minor out-in-the-wop-wops towns are out-in-the-wop-wops. Any artificiality that is there doesn't come from the design, but from the limitations of gaming technology in 2001. That kind of limitation is something I can forgive; invisible walls, no.
I'm not saying it's perfect, just that what the author of TFA is asking for is not something unachievable. It has been done. It could be done even better. I look forward to that (and welcome recommendations!).
Yes, video. Not commercially yet, but it's on its way. Take a look at Using Photographs to Enhance Videos of a Static Scene, from 2007. It's... rather impressive. Removal of defects and occluding objects is shown in the demo video at 00:44 onwards and 6:00 onwards.
Judging from the results of several Google searches, one of the people credited for the demo, Aseem Agarwala, works for Adobe -- look for interesting things in After Effects CS5. One of the others, Pravin Bhat, apparently works for Weta Digital; and two of the others, Michael Cohen and Sing Bing Kang, are with Microsoft. The rest appear to be academics.
It's not just about politics and current events, it's about culture as well. I get that. Look at it this way: when you were 6, had your parents taught you not to accept rides or candy from strangers? Well, imagine that kind of thing, plus being taught one or more of the following:
that there are things you must (never) say when someone in a uniform asks you a question
that the man accompanying the class on the field trip works for the government
not to mention that your aunt married a Jewish man
not to mention that you are Jewish
not to mention that you are Muslim
not to mention that your family goes to church
not to mention that your family doesn't go to church
not to go into the field with the big sign with a skull and crossbones
what a curfew is
etc.
Any child who has to be taught any of the above things is living in an oppressed society (not necessarily by their own government, in the minefield case), and will remember and recognise what these things mean as they get older.
I think I'd be very annoyed if Ubuntu required me to choose amongst alternatives for each large piece of software it installs by default.
I would too, as things stand.
However, if Ubuntu had a monopoly market share, and Canonical produced its own browser/graphics app/etc., and then Canonical used Ubuntu's market share to leverage market share for the browser/graphics app/etc.,... then I think I might have a different attitude.
ISPs that will implement the DIA filter
* Vodafone/Ihug
* TelstraClear
* Maxnet
ISPs that won’t implement the DIA filter
* Orcon
* Natcom
* Callplus/Slingshot
ISPs that will offer filtered and unfiltered feeds
* Snap
ISPs on the fence
* Telecom/Xtra
* World Exchange (WxC)
* WIC
Numerous ISPs unaccounted for there, but I've been meaning to move away from TelstraClear ever since I first found out about this. I'm fairly deeply ashamed that I haven't already.
Slashdot Mirror
Oh, so on top of the internal corruption at the university we have wiki-corruption too! ... What a surprise. That's never happened before, naturally.
Maybe this guy needs to list Editing Wikipedia as his primary job and Professor at Auburn University as his 2nd job?
Perhaps, but I suspect this story says more about Auburn University Montgomery than it says about his research profile.
I had never heard of Auburn University Montgomery before today; given the nature of this story, I don't expect ever to hear of it in any serious context again.
... anyone who knows anything about computers can easily see that it's just a thin sheen of technobabble hastily thrown on top of a standard action movie. Props to the guy they got to do the UNIX commands in the real life scenes, but other than that, the tech stuff was so out of this world ...
That gets to the heart of the difference between Legacy and Tron, and I'm surprised I haven't seen that comment made more widely. Tron's world-inside-the-computer was visually cool, but it also allowed those in the know to geek out a little over how they rendered real computer concepts. Tron had --
All of these things were part of the world-inside conceit. In Legacy, by contrast, the only thing remaining is programmes-as-characters. We now get to see that they have code (but why? shouldn't they be binary blobs?), but all of the rest of it has vanished. The game grid has been retained as well, but now it's meaningless! Surely more people have noticed that ALL the computer-geek stuff is in the real world -- NONE of it is inside the machine? As a result, the world inside the machine is nothing more than a cool-looking veneer over a generic and dull fantasy setting.
Now, the game Tron 2.0 (by contrast, again) absolutely nailed the core idea. It added nifty mechanics like permissions, viruses, and code optimisation; missions that involved things like getting through a firewall, hacking servers, compiling code, escaping from a HDD format, and getting a PDA to do what you tell it by draining its battery.
Both sequels looked cool. But the sequel that really carried on the cool ideas in the original is to be forgotten, alas. Instead we've got the utterly unengaging fantasy realm as "canon". Sigh.
I wish I knew what we'd be doing 100 years from today.
Decomposing.
There's even talk that Assange might be Time's "Man of the Year".
Certainly looks like Time is prepping him for that role.
Do you know of a good alternative? I agree, the pages related to my field are horrible and at looking at the discussions, practically uncorrectable [...] I do appreciate what is there though, particularly for subjects that other resources would neglect.
Well, there's always a trade-off between expertise and general coverage. So when choosing what to devote my efforts to, I'll go for more specialised venues, basically.
For academic subjects, a partial solution in print/e-book format is specialised, ad hoc encyclopaedias with references (so NOT like the Britannica, which is a horribly awful example of an encyclopaedia in almost every way). Still better is the current trend for "companions", i.e. volumes on a specific topic with entire in-depth chapters on sub-topics written by experts. For my own use (and not just in my field), the best series are currently those published by CUP and Blackwell. Either of these avoids the danger of cliques with tyrannical power, precisely because they're smaller, more autonomous, projects.
There are online equivalents, of course; here's one project that I have a great deal of respect for, though I'm not a contributor myself, and though I think it wouldn't take much for quality control to slip badly. But I think you'll agree it's pretty damn specialised. (Even there I have found errors, but the reason I haven't signed up and corrected them yet is because I'm still working on publishing the independent research that would serve as a basis for correcting them :-)
For areas outside my speciality, you're right, resources like Wikipedia are often unavoidable. That's the trade-off I was talking about. But I get the impression that we're more talking about the question of what resources an expert should be trying to contribute to. In academic areas, I'd say the most productive thing to do is edit or contribute to companions, specialist encyclopaedias, or moderated online equivalents thereof. And, when academics are not doing research or writing it up in journal articles, this is pretty much exactly what they do spend their time doing!
I doubt that, Wikipedia has thousands of revisions on even less important topics and mistakes get corrected out pretty quick, of course, if you find any 'mistakes' then perhaps you should try to fix them as any expert in any field should be doing..
I can certainly vouch for the GP's sentiment in my own area of expertise. I actually use Wikipedia primarily as a tool for finding out what kinds of misinformation there are floating around in the wild; it's a useful gauge of what misinformation is popularly perceived to be "true".
Experts have much better things to do than edit Wikipedia; it's abundantly clear that all editing is controlled by people with vested interests who use opaque processes to silence dissent. Experts do have a responsibility to write popular science, targetted at educated non-specialists. However, there's absolutely no point doing so in a venue that will invariably introduce errors after it's been written.
I note that at this moment, the front page has
-- all separate, i.e. five stories.
FUCK THIS SHIT, and fuck all the Apple astroturfers like Paska just below.
What was wrong with Fear and Loathing?
or The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus? (OK, I can see how that might not be for everyone ... but I find it hard to imagine someone liking Twelve Monkeys but not Imaginarium.)
Heck I haggle on small ticket items. When I buy wine, if I find a good one I'll ask for a discount if I buy 3 or more bottles.
I bet the restaurants just loooove you.
It would be obvious to anyone with half a braincell that this is not a tactic that you employ after you've already received the product (when you get up to pay in a restaurant) or with someone who literally has no power to offer deals (the checkout operator). Trying to haggle before you eat the meal is entirely reasonable, however.
When haggling is practised in a non-brain-dead way, the GP is absolutely correct. If you're in a supermarket looking at the wine section and you talk to someone who actually has some responsibility in that section, then sure they might be willing to consider giving you a deal if you're buying a case at a time. (Getting a deal on three bottles, as the GP says ... well, good luck.) If you're in an electronics shop and you talk to someone who isn't (a) someone on their first day on the job, (b) a powerless checkout operator, or (c) an ass, of course it's OK to discuss alternative pricing options. (If the sitation is (c), it is of course best to go to a different shop.)
They might be less willing if the product you're after is already discounted, but then we're back in "Is brain operational?" territory; it's still worth a try, but don't get your hopes up.
Syntax is not morphology: response to TaoPhoenix
TaoPhoenix's useful summary of the development of the "fruitfly" correctly points out that the summary is missing an o. However, the author incorrectly describes this as a syntax error.(1)
This is not a syntax error but a morphology error. Syntax refers to the study of observed patterns in the sequential arrangement of words or lexemes;(2) morphology refers to the study of how lexemes change their form (e.g. requiring an extra "o" or not).(3)
In addition, the author's use of the spelling "Drosophilia" is a morphology error. ("Drosophilia" would signify "the love of dew" in the abstract; "Drosophila", with the implied substantive "zoa", signifies "life-forms that love dew".)(4),(5)
References:
(1) TaoPhoenix, Re:Backwards compatibility
(2) Wikipedia, Syntax
(3) Wikipedia, Morphology (linguistics)
(4) LSJ Greek-English Lexicon, philia
(5) LSJ Greek-English Lexicon, philos, sense II.2
How do you kill that which has no life?!
That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange aeons even death may die.
Duh!
Fair point. OK, I am still left wondering then ...
I think that kind of attitude to classics is a direct consequence of how classics are chosen for schooling purposes. I don't know why, but high school curricula tend to focus on the most depressing reading they can find. Given a choice between two classics, where one is fun and/or uplifting and the other is depressing and/or horrifying, they'll always opt for the latter. Compare the following two lists:
Painful, degrading; books to slit your wrists to. Even dreary in some cases. Great, maybe, but horrible. However:
Terrific, human, inspiring; when they're not uplifting, they make up for it by being funny. Completely different, even though two authors and one epic tradition appear in both lists.
So why not go for the second list? Actually, I think I know the reason: it's politics. Tom Jones and Dangerous Liaisons have too much sex, Marx liked Robinson Crusoe, Pride and Prejudice sends the wrong messages about gender roles, the Odyssey sends the message that vengeance is OK (obviously it isn't; vengeance is only OK in war, like in the Iliad) and so on. I guess books that encourage suicidal depression are fine, though.
guest@xkcd:/$ look
You are at a computer using unixkcd.
Exits: west, south
guest@xkcd:/$ go west
Life is peaceful there.
Exits: east, west
guest@xkcd:/$ go west
In the open air.
Exits: east, west
guest@xkcd:/$ go west
Where the skies are blue.
Exits: east, west
guest@xkcd:/$ go west
This is what we're gonna do.
Exits: east, west
guest@xkcd:/$ go west
Sun in wintertime.
Exits: east, west
guest@xkcd:/$ go west
We will do just fine.
guest@xkcd:/$ sudo -i
sudo: -i: command not found
Ah, but:
guest@xkcd:/$ sudo make me a sandwich
Okay.
First post! From Auckland
First reply! From Wellington
... wait, that's the wrong way round
What on earth are you talking about? or even think you are talking about? What is it you imagine Google has done here? Conroy was simply attacking Google to distract attention from how much everyone hates the censorship, not because Google had done or said anything at all.
Maybe a full transcript of his remarks will help. TRANSCRIPT follows. Context: the host is trying to get quick closing comments from the Minister and from Colin Jacobs, the VP of Electronic Frontiers Australia. He asks for a closing comment from the Minister first; Jacobs is not given a chance to comment. (No one has even mentioned Google, Inc.)
I don't know. It's still Google turning round to a country and saying "Your laws are wrong".
(a) It's called "lobbying". I realise this may shock you, but it's not actually uncommon, and it is rarely frowned on anywhere.
(b) Google has done nothing of the kind. Conroy's comments were an unprovoked attack on Google, not a response to an attack by Google.
It's actually extremely hard to create such universes. No one has ever made one, as we speak. Not only there are hardware limitations (for example, a HL2 level takes almost all of 1 GB), but there are also software limitations.
I just came here after playing some Morrowind. That takes a lot less than 1 GB. Even heavily modded to make it look visually stunning it takes less than 1 GB.
Now, sure, there are serious immersion-breaking AI limitations, gameplay irritations, it's got olde-style graphics, and the art design isn't to everyone's taste. But I still find it a hell of a lot more immersive than any game published since that I can think of. No invisible walls; no unopenable doors; no unkillable NPCs; lethal parts of the world are explicably lethal; major towns are major, minor out-in-the-wop-wops towns are out-in-the-wop-wops. Any artificiality that is there doesn't come from the design, but from the limitations of gaming technology in 2001. That kind of limitation is something I can forgive; invisible walls, no.
I'm not saying it's perfect, just that what the author of TFA is asking for is not something unachievable. It has been done. It could be done even better. I look forward to that (and welcome recommendations!).
Addendum: there's a link to a higher-quality QuickTime copy of the demo video, and also a Youtube copy if you dislike Vimeo.
Yes, video. Not commercially yet, but it's on its way. Take a look at Using Photographs to Enhance Videos of a Static Scene, from 2007. It's ... rather impressive. Removal of defects and occluding objects is shown in the demo video at 00:44 onwards and 6:00 onwards.
Judging from the results of several Google searches, one of the people credited for the demo, Aseem Agarwala, works for Adobe -- look for interesting things in After Effects CS5. One of the others, Pravin Bhat, apparently works for Weta Digital; and two of the others, Michael Cohen and Sing Bing Kang, are with Microsoft. The rest appear to be academics.
It's not just about politics and current events, it's about culture as well. I get that. Look at it this way: when you were 6, had your parents taught you not to accept rides or candy from strangers? Well, imagine that kind of thing, plus being taught one or more of the following:
Any child who has to be taught any of the above things is living in an oppressed society (not necessarily by their own government, in the minefield case), and will remember and recognise what these things mean as they get older.
I think I'd be very annoyed if Ubuntu required me to choose amongst alternatives for each large piece of software it installs by default.
I would too, as things stand.
However, if Ubuntu had a monopoly market share, and Canonical produced its own browser/graphics app/etc., and then Canonical used Ubuntu's market share to leverage market share for the browser/graphics app/etc., ... then I think I might have a different attitude.
Also important:
ISPs that will implement the DIA filter
* Vodafone/Ihug
* TelstraClear
* Maxnet
ISPs that won’t implement the DIA filter
* Orcon
* Natcom
* Callplus/Slingshot
ISPs that will offer filtered and unfiltered feeds
* Snap
ISPs on the fence
* Telecom/Xtra
* World Exchange (WxC)
* WIC
Numerous ISPs unaccounted for there, but I've been meaning to move away from TelstraClear ever since I first found out about this. I'm fairly deeply ashamed that I haven't already.